I saw the other thread about memorizing lines, but I'm asking a different question, so I made my own.


Since I've never had any memorization coaching, or acting classes, I'm not sure how to memorize my lines.


So far, I just lay on my bed and picture the scene going on in my head, and I say my lines, acting them as I feel they should be acted.


I have no clue about the terms people are using, like beat.

Also, since this is my first real acting role, what will happen if I fuck up, or forget my line, or I just am not a great actor?

I mean, for me, someday I can act great (to me) somedays, I feel like I suck.

quote:

Originally posted by SaintSpader:
I saw the other thread about memorizing lines, but I'm asking a different question, so I made my own.


Since I've never had any memorization coaching, or acting classes, I'm not sure how to memorize my lines.


So far, I just lay on my bed and picture the scene going on in my head, and I say my lines, acting them as I feel they should be acted.


I have no clue about the terms people are using, like beat.

Also, since this is my first real acting role, what will happen if I fuck up, or forget my line, or I just am not a great actor?

I mean, for me, someday I can act great (to me) somedays, I feel like I suck.

Don't worry man, there will be times when you think you suck, even the very best actors do. It's part of the experience, so don't worry.

as far as memorization goes. Practice, practice, practice. There are probably a thousand opinions on the best way to memorize he is mine.

I don't think you should memorize AT ALL until you know exactly what you are saying. I know this may sound basic but MANY MANY people skip right to getting the words down before really understanding the character before they start to memorize.

A great acting coach of mine Gerry Speca gave me this indespensible list of questions that I ask myself before I do any memorizing

Who Am I
What do I want (objective)
Why do I want it (need)
Who do I want it from
What stands in my way (obsticle)
What do I plan to do to get it
What leverage do I have to obtain it (power)
What am I willing to do to get it
When do I want it (immediacy)
Where am I (surroundings)


If you go line by line (because sometimes during a scene you objective will change) and answer each question, first about the piece as a whole then, about each line, the memorization will come.

But if you first start just saying the words without an understanding of whats behind them, with the intent to memorize, not only will it be A LOT harder (trust me) to memorize. But if you DO memorize them without the intent behind the words your performance will be flat and it will also be much harder to take direction.

Think about it;
I learned the pledge of allegiance in school but I never learned what the words meant. I'm sure this is the same for most children so when it spoken it's usually monotone and without feeling, yet they know every word.

AFTER you have answered all the questions run it and run it and run it. Until you could sing it like a song. Heck, sing it like a song (with the intent)

Don't worry about how it SHOULD be acted. Once you can answer the above questions not only will the memorization be much more simple, but it will be a three dimensional character and you will already be doing what you SHOULD be doing.

As far as beats, there are two ways beats are usually reffered to. Maybe more but these are what popped into my head.

The first is a..... pause in a sentence. Sometimes used to indicate that the character is thinking. Or that they are about to say something important, or something very hard to say
EX: Honey.....I love you
But...I want a divorce
I....I don't understand

Another beat people refer to is when they are talking about a shift

It's when the character is taking a different approach to his or her objective or perhaps the obsticle has changed or become greater or the immediacy has changed.

EX: I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU WANT TO PUT THE DOG DOWN! I DON'T CARE IF HE'S OLD HE'S A MEMBER OF THE FAMILY! But if you think that it's what's best then ok.

Obviously the beggining and end of this line will be said much differently. There is a "shift" or beat from yelling to an acceptance

Now quite often (usually) beats wont be this exaggerated they will be more subtle. So in order to play the scene most effectively you must look for such beats. The place where something shifts about the scene. Either the characters obsticle

EX: Someone during a fight could pull out a gun...BIG SHIFT, your obsticle just went from someones hands to a serious weapon.

Or your objective might change

EX: If your in a fight with your significant other and your objective is to make her understand your point of view, and your obscicle would be her unwillingness to listen, suppose she starts crying during the scene. Your objective might change from getting her to see your point of view to comforting her. Of course your objective might not change (she might pull this crap all the time), but your obsticle has.

It could even be pretty mundane

EX: Your objective is to go get gas, but the gas light just came on chaning you immediacy.
Thaen lets suppose there is a detour, which would intensify you obsticle.

I hope this helps.

quote:

Originally posted by SaintSpader:
Since I've never had any memorization coaching, or acting classes, I'm not sure how to memorize my lines.

So far, I just lay on my bed and picture the scene going on in my head, and I say my lines, acting them as I feel they should be acted.

There is nothing wrong with that. I memorize by pure repetition. I don't care whether or not I understand the character yet. For me, once I'm memorized, the character/script analysis goes much more quickly and smoothly.

But... everyone has a different approach and different things work for different people. I encourage you to try different things and see what works best.

In either case, your memory WILL get better the more you use it.

quote:

I have no clue about the terms people are using, like beat.

Zenial's answer was spot on.

quote:

Also, since this is my first real acting role, what will happen if I fuck up, or forget my line, or I just am not a great actor?

Look at it this way... somebody thought you were good enough to be in their production. They could have went with someone else, but they went with you. If you suck, it's THEIR fault.

But remember that acting is a process. You aren't going to be great your first time out. Just make sure you learn from it... and continue learning from it.

Zenial gave you a great place to start with that list of questions you can ask of your character and the scene. If you understand all that technical stuff (the intentions, the motivations, the obstacles, etc) then you shouldn't need to worry about it.

For one, there is probably a "key line" in every scene that you can always fall to if you forget a line.

Second, if you know what's going on, you should be able to improv your way back to the text.

Third, you'll have other actors on stage to help you (unless you're in that rare instance when you're on by yourself... in which case, see #2).

Finally, just over-prepare. If you can recite all your lines forward AND backward, you probably won't screw up at all.

quote:

I mean, for me, someday I can act great (to me) somedays, I feel like I suck.

All of your worries are things we all probably went through... and still go through. I constantly worry about dropping lines. So I just over-prepare. I've literally memorized all my lines forward AND BACKWARD.

And yeah, I've dropped lines. But the trick is to not stand there like a deer in headlights. If you are 'involved' with the motivations and intentions, there is no reason that should happen to you.

Good luck!

Ah that was gold Zenial! Thank you so much, I actually felt like I was that character in that scene.


I'll save that post of yours, if you don't mind?


And Pauly, thanks for the advice, thats helpful in so many ways.

quote:

Originally posted by SaintSpader:
Ah that was gold Zenial! Thank you so much, I actually felt like I was that character in that scene.


I'll save that post of yours, if you don't mind?


And Pauly, thanks for the advice, thats helpful in so many ways.

No problem man. But really you can thank my coach Gerry it's his list. And don't forget the more specific the better. for instance with location it's not just inside, or on a couch. You need to know how cold it is, is the couch comfortable, is it the first time you've been there, that goes for all the questions. And if there is anything the script doesn't give you RAISE THE STAKES. If it's a friend in trouble, make it you best frined, if it's a job interview, assume it's your dream job and you won't be able to eat if you don't get paid.

Specificity and high stakes. You get those down and you'll do just fine.

The way I was taught to memorize lines when I was a young has helped me throughout my career.

The method I was taught was to repeat the line to yourself, in chunks, in a monotone voice, quietly and quickly. I keep repeating that chunk until I have it down and then add the next chunk to it and run through both until I have those down - and so on and so forth.

Once you get the hang of it you can learn things wicked fast. I was on my way to film a scene with a three page narration that I had to be off book for and learned the whole thing on the subway ride from Manhattan to Brooklyn.

Whatever you do, do not memorize the lines with a certain intonation. If you do, it will come off as empty. You should be able to deliver them like like the happiest person in the world, or the most pissed off without missing a beat.

All the stuff that Zenial said is very important, though I would say that the breaking down of the script isn't really memorization as much as it is just understanding the scene.

Saintspader like it was mentioned before everyone has their own way of memorizing lines. It's which ever way comes natural to you. Me I prefer putting it on tape recorder at times. I'll put the other actors lines on tape leave a couple of space for my lines. That works well for me. Or I'll write out my lines on paper over and over. (As if I were still in grammer school in detention writing on the blckboard a 100x- I WILL NOT TALK ) Another style I like is to just run lines with a friend until it starts to come natural to me. Within that time I'm no longer just saying lines. I'm listening to the other person I'm out of my head now. Then I can respond truthfully. There now is a purpose for what I, and how I'm responding back the the reader. It's organic. Just trust yourself.

quote:

Originally posted by Mvezza:
The way I was taught to memorize lines when I was a young has helped me throughout my career.

The method I was taught was to repeat the line to yourself, in chunks, in a monotone voice, quietly and quickly. I keep repeating that chunk until I have it down and then add the next chunk to it and run through both until I have those down - and so on and so forth.

Once you get the hang of it you can learn things wicked fast. I was on my way to film a scene with a three page narration that I had to be off book for and learned the whole thing on the subway ride from Manhattan to Brooklyn.

THIS is how I always did it and it's also how instyructors told the class to do it. It's golden. It works.

Do it this way, as in memorize it first then add the emotion etc AFTER.

quote:

Originally posted by Mvezza:
The way I was taught to memorize lines when I was a young has helped me throughout my career.

The method I was taught was to repeat the line to yourself, in chunks, in a monotone voice, quietly and quickly. I keep repeating that chunk until I have it down and then add the next chunk to it and run through both until I have those down - and so on and so forth.

Once you get the hang of it you can learn things wicked fast. I was on my way to film a scene with a three page narration that I had to be off book for and learned the whole thing on the subway ride from Manhattan to Brooklyn.

I'd like to give this a shot. How large should each "chunk" be?

quote:

Originally posted by PaulyWally:

quote:

Originally posted by Mvezza:
The way I was taught to memorize lines when I was a young has helped me throughout my career.

The method I was taught was to repeat the line to yourself, in chunks, in a monotone voice, quietly and quickly. I keep repeating that chunk until I have it down and then add the next chunk to it and run through both until I have those down - and so on and so forth.

Once you get the hang of it you can learn things wicked fast. I was on my way to film a scene with a three page narration that I had to be off book for and learned the whole thing on the subway ride from Manhattan to Brooklyn.

I'd like to give this a shot. How large should each "chunk" be?

A few lines, whatever you feel comfortable with. You'll feel what works as you go.

Example-

"To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing, end them?"

I would say that is a nice chunk to start on in this example. You wouldn't have to worry about the first line in this instance as one would hope the reader would know it already. So consider from the second line on as being the first passage.

Just over and over, quickly in a monotone with no inflection.

And just for the hell of it-

To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pitch and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.

I tend to do the cumulative route - learn 1 line, then 2, repeat both, learn the 3rd, repeat all three, etc. For practical reasons, I may 'chunk" as well (so I don't end up repeating two pages for each new line). The other thing I do sometimes is learn from the back forwards, so I'm freed from the 'forward momentum' of the scene and just battening down the words.

The best way to memorize lines is to act if they are not lines at all, but words that have no meaning-gibberish. That way the scene will never come out the same, and you will be living moment to moment without any preconceived notion of what is "right way" to do the scene. How you do this is take all the punctuation and capitals out of the text and learn it just as words. It's 10 times harder, but your work will be 10 times better.

Unfortunately, something you will run into is the fact that you do lack training and experience. You will start to be labeled at "green" and all of that. How you can get around this is to learn a craft, so that when somebody tells you your inexperienced, you can slam them in the face with your great technique. A great teacher is Anthony Vincent Bova at the Bova Actors Workshop. He has weekly classes, and is super nurturing to the actor. The stuff he teaches is invaluable, no other class in the city is like it. Just visit Bovaactorsworkshop.com if you want more info.

It's great you're exploring acting.

Anyone can memorize words and text - you memorized your times tables, your way home, and your login to this website, no?

Read the play silently 250 times. Every part of it. That will help. Every line - even the other actors' lines.

Everything else is about the acting itself, which I think is something a good coach should help you with.

Go audit some of your local coach's classes and see which one you get the most out of. Start with that coach.

You'll see a lot of terms like "beat" and "choices" and this and that. Again, a good coach can help you sort that all out.

I really cannot stress this enough. Unless you really really really do not have the time, DO NOT memorize your lines until you know EXACTLY what you are saying, that is the how's and why's. You need to go sentence by sentence and figure out why you are saying it who you're saying it to, and so on and so on.

Until you do that work (and until you can answer every single question I posted above, you haven't) none of your lines should be memorized!

In my opinion learning your lines before understanding them fully and deeply is like throwing paint on a canvass and the pushing it around to where you want it. You might get something close to what you were looking for but not nearly as brilliant as it could be.

I promise by the time you have done all the work and understand your lines completely...they will very close to, if not memorized.

quote:

Originally posted by Fally7385:
The best way to memorize lines is to act if they are not lines at all, but words that have no meaning-gibberish. That way the scene will never come out the same, and you will be living moment to moment without any preconceived notion of what is "right way" to do the scene. How you do this is take all the punctuation and capitals out of the text and learn it just as words. It's 10 times harder, but your work will be 10 times better.

Unfortunately, something you will run into is the fact that you do lack training and experience. You will start to be labeled at "green" and all of that. How you can get around this is to learn a craft, so that when somebody tells you your inexperienced, you can slam them in the face with your great technique. A great teacher is Anthony Vincent Bova at the Bova Actors Workshop. He has weekly classes, and is super nurturing to the actor. The stuff he teaches is invaluable, no other class in the city is like it. Just visit Bovaactorsworkshop.com if you want more info.

I honestly have no idea how to react to this. I can only assume you are kidding.

If you ARE serious have you ever stopped to think that the writer put the punctuation in the text for a reason. Or do you feel that you are not obligated to the writer in any way, or to his character in any way.

I really can't even believe I just responded to this post. I just feel I would not be able to live with myself knowing that someone might actually take this advice.

quote:

Originally posted by Richard Scott:
It's great you're exploring acting.

Anyone can memorize words and text - you memorized your times tables, your way home, and your login to this website, no?

Read the play silently 250 times. Every part of it. That will help. Every line - even the other actors' lines.

Everything else is about the acting itself, which I think is something a good coach should help you with.

Go audit some of your local coach's classes and see which one you get the most out of. Start with that coach.

You'll see a lot of terms like "beat" and "choices" and this and that. Again, a good coach can help you sort that all out.

Again, I can only assume you are kidding, but please people come here for real advice and it's hard enough without your fake advice.

In case you are serious. 250 times!!! So just spend 20 days straight without taking any rests and then that sucker will be memorized. WHAT!!??

Let's do the math here 250 times, ok lets say it takes an hour and a half to read a script, 90 minutes.

90 minutes X 250 reads = 22,500 minutes
22,500 minutes / 60 = 375 hours
375 / 24 = 15.625 days

So assuming you are a mere mortal and cannot read a script for 24 hours a day. But you feel that this would be a good idea and decided to read for, oh, say, 6 hours straight a day. It would just take 62 days to memorize those lines. Not bad, now all you have to do is rehearse.

I think the important thing to remember in this business is everyone's opinion is just that -their opinion. Mine included. So try out a few things and find out what works best for you! Good luck!

quote:

Again, I can only assume you are kidding, but please people come here for real advice and it's hard enough without your fake advice.

In case you are serious. 250 times!!! So just spend 20 days straight without taking any rests and then that sucker will be memorized. WHAT!!??

Let's do the math here 250 times, ok lets say it takes an hour and a half to read a script, 90 minutes.

90 minutes X 250 reads = 22,500 minutes
22,500 minutes / 60 = 375 hours
375 / 24 = 15.625 days

So assuming you are a mere mortal and cannot read a script for 24 hours a day. But you feel that this would be a good idea and decided to read for, oh, say, 6 hours straight a day. It would just take 62 days to memorize those lines. Not bad, now all you have to do is rehearse.

I'm dead serious. And I also said you should find a coach. You can't learn the acting job on backstage.com forums!

To your math calculation: You will discover it doesn't take that long.

And so what if it did?

You want acting to be your full time job, right? So, show up at work today and tell your boss that 20 days of reading is just too much. Really. Try it.

quote:

Originally posted by GreginLA:
As Lawrence Olivier said to a young Anthony Hopkins, the very first thing you need is to do is get the lines. So, when one is looking at a typical script, memorizing all one’s lines can seem overwhelming. Another point of confusion is the fact that movies and television shows are usually shot out of order. This makes it more difficult as you cannot memorize the script chronologically. So, just as the old saying goes about how to eat an elephant, you take one bite at a time. Break down the script into specific scenes after you identify your lines within a scene. Split them up and mix them up so that each packet of collected pages is a different scene. Here are a couple ways to start your memorization.
2. The recorder technique: Read the scene into a tape recorder perfectly. Then listen to the recording as you are reading the scene many times.

I actually like to use my old school tape recorder like this, except i do it in reverse order. I record everyone else's lines first then leave a blank space in which to reply. Works for me!!